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Topic: Archivarius (Read 54072 times)

I have tried most of the mainstream desktop search tools, starting with blinkx and the first beta from Google. I especially liked Copernic, and that was the one I ran for the longest period. When Google launched their latest version, I decided to give it another try, tempted by some of the nice interface design work going on over at aqua-soft.org (especially the Getchoo project). Then I installed NOD32, and stumbled upon the documented incompatibility between these two products (read Google websites and you’ll learn it’s NOD’s fault, read security websites and you’ll learn it’s Google’s fault). That was a drag, but not enough to convince to change desktop searcher again. But then I changed my email over to The Bat!, and it was only yesterday that I realised GDS was no longer indexing new mail. A bit of research turned up a plugin for GDS, but that was described as buggy (and I would still have the draggy NOD/GDS problem); so I decided to look around. There is an excellent comparative chart of the various Desktop Search tools over at: http://www.goebelgro...om/desktopmatrix.htm I hadn’t heard of the only program listed there that indexed The Bat!, Archivarius 3000, so I decided to give it a try – and I really like what I found.

Like most of the other tools in its class, Archivarius is a small download (3mb) – you’ll find it over at www.likasoft.com. I found it a very straightforward install, and it indexed my 35,000 documents and emails in a matter of minutes. In creating an index, you start by choosing exactly what you want indexed, either by selecting common items or choosing specific files, folders, or data types. So you’re completely and easily in charge of what is and isn’t archived, right from the start. If you choose, for instance, to index your The Bat! email, you then go on to select which folders should and shouldn’t be indexed.

Next, you get to choose which document types are indexed – it really is an exhaustive list, from common word-processing formats (MS Word, Write, and Works; WordPerfect, RTF) through Excel, PDF, ICQ chat files, and many more (including Zinio Reader magazines, which is new format to me, and looks fun and useful).

Then you choose file extensions to be indexed, then document encodings, then whether or not to extract documents from archives (which is done with a built-in archiver, so no external software is needed).

All of these settings, after the first step of choosing what you want to index, can be set in Program Settings and inherited from there – and the default settings are probably going to be fine for most users (and certainly for me!).

When you’re done with all this, you can choose when the index is created – either immediately, or at a later time – and you can get an estimate of how big the index will be: on this machine, it comes to most of a whopping half-a-gigabyte, but disk space is cheap, and the lightning fast search results are well-worth that impact to me.

So, once it’s finished indexing, you can just click on the ‘Search’ button and enter your query, and within moments – it tells you how many moments in the bottom right corner of its window – the results are there, previewed with each of your search terms highlighted. I put my boss’s name in (this is the machine I use as his secretary), and up come more than 20,000 results in just over 12 seconds. Double-click any one of those and you open the hit in a simple text viewer (which, according to the website, can deal with very large files); again, each of your search terms is highlighted.

Or you can switch to list view, which simply lists file titles, folders, dates, without previews. You can also choose from a number of different headers in this list, so it’s highly customisable.

You can also index and search remotely, as well as on removable media. All this, and it’s running at just 16mb of memory while open, and at less than 10mb when it’s running in the system tray.

Unlike the other Desktop Searchers I tried, you can specify when it does its indexing, so you’re always in easy control.

I like Archivarius – it’s simple and straightforward, but it doesn’t sacrifice any flexibility or control. It’s a powerful indexer and searcher – and it indexes what I consider to be the best email client around. It does what it says on the box, reliably and plainly, and it’s just what I need in my work.

Of course, I’m just getting to know it, and what I’ve said here is really a beginner’s enthusiasm in getting to know a new program – there are so many features I haven’t even looked into yet, but I’ll recommend it very highly based on my experience so far.

For future reference the only way I have found to embed images in the message body is to upload them to the web somewhere and then insert the image via a URL (there is an image button above the message wrtiting window).

If you haven't got easy access to webspace you could sign up for free space at Yahoo.com (just sign up for a free email account and then go to your user profile and set up a free Geocities account). I don't really like Geocities as a webhosting solution (too many ads on the pages) but as a repository for graphics it is fine

really nice to hear the background also about what drove you from the mainstream tools.

i tend to agree with your desire to have a search tool that you have real control over which doesn't index stuff unless and until you tell it to, which is another reason i liked archivarius as well. plus the fact that it indexed .chm files.

i will see if i can't find a way to reference images attached to posts - seems like it should be possible..

Carol and Mouser both just mentioned hosting pics.I use the following free image hosting services and have never lost a pic. All three encourage hotlinking and even provide the code for direct links, indirect links, thumbnails, forum bbcode links, etc.Arranged in order of the favorite to least favorite. Some are better at some things than others.

You know what would be nice, maybe we can make a little small graphic icon representing donationcoder.com reviews and user mini-reviews, that sites like cliff's can use when they use to identify something from donationcoder.com..

That's a good site. I found it last year. They've also got reviews on free email services and free webhosting. I've checked out most of the image services there but I'm happy with the ones I mentioned above. Let me know when you've started a thread on them and I'll be happy to contribute.

Unfortunately dancing was out - the concert (http://www.joanarmatrading.com/) was excellent but the seating was really uncomfortable. I couldn't actually sit straight in m seat because the balcony wall was too close in front of me. Poor chap next to me was even more uncomfy as his legs were too long even sitting at an angle!

If you want to see her she still has quite a few UK dates and Belgium (!!!) (unfortunately the US and Canada dates were last month).

This Archivarius is a cool piece of software. I really like it a lot, from what little I've used it. Granted, I'm not too big on desktop searching softwares, namely because I keep my computer really OCD organized. I have an extremely organized file structure, I keep multiple note-taking databases for random notes and information, and my email program is well organized as well. But, sometimes, it does help to find something where you need to search across the board. Archivarius does this pretty nicely. And it's a lightweight program! And relatively cheap, especially if you're a student.

The only other desktop search I've used is X1, and I like archivarius better. There's barely anything on the internet about this program, how come? Weird.

Hm, I guess I might give it a spin... not too keen on the desktop search things, but I guess that's because the first I ever looked as was google, with it's horrible run-in-webbrowser strategy, and the almost viral way it pops up on people's machines >_<

EDIT: I think I need to tweak the settings of which file to index a bit... or perhaps index only part of my data. Estimate: 690'152 documents, 396.89 GB, 146.8GB index size. That's a task for tomorrow

superboyac - what is it that you especially like about archivarius? I'm just curious - I've tried Filehand, YDS, X1 and have recently gone back to Copernic. X1 was the best of the bunch in terms of speed and features but had all sorts of "issues", most irritatingly with Outlook (putting a notebook into standby or hibernate with Outlook minimized to the system tray - take that, Raymond Chen - caused errors in both X1 and Outlook on resuming my system). Copernic is OK, but it takes quite a while to display previews of the files that it finds, which is very annoying. Perhaps I should take archivarius for a test drive...

superboyac - what is it that you especially like about archivarius? I'm just curious - I've tried Filehand, YDS, X1 and have recently gone back to Copernic. X1 was the best of the bunch in terms of speed and features but had all sorts of "issues", most irritatingly with Outlook (putting a notebook into standby or hibernate with Outlook minimized to the system tray - take that, Raymond Chen - caused errors in both X1 and Outlook on resuming my system). Copernic is OK, but it takes quite a while to display previews of the files that it finds, which is very annoying. Perhaps I should take archivarius for a test drive...

Darwin, like I said before, I'm not much of a desktop search user, so I can't discuss the details like I normally do with other software. From what little experience I had, it seemed like Archivarius was just really lightweight, it's interface was simple, yet nothing really lacking. It was fast (faster than x1 from my experience). The only other one I've tried is x1, and I felt like archivarius was a little less intrusive as far as monitoring. I don't know, like I said, I barely have any experience with these kinds of softwares. I know a big issue with these are how compatible it is with your specific email program, etc., but I didn't even consider that. i was only concerned about text documents, word documents, and the like.

Basically, Archivarius just felt better than x1 and I liked it right off the bat. I base this on nothing more than a "sense" I've developed from using a lot of software. That probably doesn't help you at all, but it's the truth in this case.

Maybe someone with more experience should do a roundup of desktop search software, any volunteers?

I think the size of the index depends on the type of files. For example, if you're a programmer and you have 300 GB of code, that's basically all text, so the index (which is all text) is going to be large. But if you have a lot of word documents (text in a bloated container) then the index will be smaller. So, it just depends on the kinds of files you have.